Penta

Shortridge: Or, to put it another way, "The bears. You promised bears!"

Kids think they'll be camping in the real wilderness, where there are bears waiting to snack on them.

Adults would have none of that. (Neither would the bear, but that's another matter.)

So instead of heading out into the vanishing real wilderness, they camp...effectively in their backyards.

Leading to "But where are the bears?"

Was that way when *I* was a Cub Scout.

Eisely: It depends on what you want the leaders to know, I think.

I think the current BSA program re leader training, what I know of it, is good. I spun off this thread because NJCS seemed to have in mind SMs knowing a lot more about things...Which raised some pointed questions in my mind.

There's also a fact I'm coming to realize in my own life: You may not use some of the more specialized/unique skills very often. It would make sense, in those cases, to formally say "It's been so many years, go back and retrain for safety's sake!" Scouting, particularly in the outdoors...You might use those basic skills every month's outing, but what about (for example) winter camping skills?

Could leaders be trained more? Yes. But there is, as you imply, a point where it becomes very much a matter of diminishing returns.

Resqman: Good corrective re ARC. You're right, the "Roles and Missions" are not very similar. However, ARC is what came to mind first when I was writing. (Idly: While I could never see this happening, I do wonder: If ARC allowed disaster training or deployment for

Conundrum is exactly the word I would use, Beavah.

Because it feeds into something I think everybody who cares about Scouting deals with or confronts on some level. Certainly, it comes up here enough: Getting adults to volunteer. Not so much the kids, I sense - but getting adults to step up.

Scouting relies on prior skills from the adults, you say. I'll ask what needs to be asked: If that's a good thing. It definitely limits who can realistically volunteer at the unit level - How many adults do you know who were scouts, who are prior military (and had any outdoors training in that!), etc? A good number, probably, but the groups almost certainly overlap and are a very limited subset of the potential pool of volunteers. It's even worse with my generation (I'm going to take a wild guess here and presume everybody's at least 10 years older than me!) who are the volunteers coming up, because very few were Scouts (maybe more out west, but not many here on the East Coast), the number who're prior military (and have relevant skillsets) are a fraction of a percent (and I'd wager most of those are concentrated in the West or the South)...And personal camping? Not very common that it doesn't overlap with one of the two prior descriptors. That covers outdoor skills. For teaching skills...You're looking overwhelmingly at schoolteachers. That or parents. I don't see boys sticking around a group with a teacher...And parents is worth its own discussion. I personally am not sure parents of kids in the troop are the most...objective folks in the world. Certainly they can probably do the role in a pinch, but I don't see it coming without major issues.

And since we're looking for one person (the SM) who has all those skills...

You may be right in an ideal sense, Beavah, but I don't know if that ideal is going to be reachable much in the future. And when I think about Scouting, I want it around if a woman is ever mad enough to marry me and have kids, so, years in the future. I have reasons to think long-term.

Gah, you ninja'd me, Bart...

My reply to "an SM needs the same skills as a parent" is: Yes, but how many *parents* have those skills? C'mon, be honest...

I personally don't think many do. I really don't. I'd never suggest a "license to have kids" or a "license to parent", but do I think parents often have the sorts of skills NJCS lays out? No. Doesn't mean I don't think it wouldn't perhaps be a good thing if parents had a way to learn those kinds of knowledge, skills, and abilities. (Honestly, speaking as someone who's only babysat their younger cousins and watched relatives with their kids, and seen (or, while babysitting, experienced in a limited way) the frustrations to a point, I think CPS agencies could do a lot to prevent child abuse and the like by offering free parenting skills classes (and discussion groups, and similar) to parents - way before they enter the system. Say, when Mom is pregnant with the kid, or immediately after the kid is born, start the process. How many people still live where their parents, grandparents, or other relatives can help pass on the hard-won knowledge of how to raise a kid? Not many. So we need to find something to fill the same role. (Maybe those agencies already do that. I don't know.))

Hit enter too early, ugh. Where was I?

2. Training: If it is to be recalled, it needs to be practiced. Training should, if you don't do "drills" like the ARC does, be recurring - meaning your "camping cert", for example, would only last 1 or 2 years before you train again. Does BSA at any level really have the ability to fully train all its volunteers in the skills they need in an effective manner?

3. Plain and simple, how do you meld all this with the ideas that: A. Scouting is delivered to the kids by volunteers - frequently parents of kids in the unit who are busy as heck? B. Scout units can be started up by any interested group with no need for specialized skills? C. Scouting can in theory be something done intermittently, without continuing requirements? All that seems pretty important to folks around here, and rightly so. If it were to require the same time commitment as, say, Red Cross disaster response volunteering (Training requires a whack of time, then there's meetings running an hour or two every month to keep up on stuff - with a requirement that you attend 70% of meetings over I forget how long a time period before you deploy to anything, if I remember right (It's been a long while)), on top of stuff you do with/for the kids, how many would still volunteer? If it required specialized skills training, wouldn't that knock out a lot of the people who might start units? If it required continuing training, how many people would still be volunteers?

I'm not saying you aren't right, NJCubScouter: I think you are. I think that the best SMs are in fact skilled, possibly experts, in all the areas you mention.

But I wonder how that can really work in the real world.

NJCubScouter said: "Personally I think that Scoutmasters and ASM's (leaving aside any other positions) need to be well-trained in outdoor skills AND leadership skills (and other skills such as dealing with behavior issues, how to best teach skills to boys, etc.) The two (or more) are not mutually exclusive."

I promised myself I wouldn't get involved with these threads. I am not an active Scouter, my Scouting career wearing the tan uniform was brief and undistinguished, and I don't even go camping anymore. Haven't since I was a Boy Scout, actually. Take everything I say with that note of humility in mind, please. I will fully admit that I don't have "skin in the game", no matter how much I wish I did.

But I wanted to point this out, because I think it basically demands discussion. NJCubScouter, that's a pretty wide range of skills you're calling for an SM to be expert (or at least "skilled") in...Some of them not commonly available.

Now, I may have no dog in the fight over Patrol Method or anything like that, but I am someone who still thinks it wouldn't be a bad thing if a Scout unit could start by pulling itself up by the bootstraps, if need be, as units originally did. If they can be started with full BSA support, that's ideal, but there are plenty of situations I can see where they may not be happening.

How is a SM supposed to train themselves in all that? Additionally, from where I sit, I do not get the impression that the BSA, either National or councils, necessarily has the training infrastructure to support the kind of recurrent training, updates, refreshers, etc. of volunteers on all those topics that would seem to be required.

I mean, let's think about it realistically. Skills are perishable. I would never presume someone who had not trained in, say, some aspect of outdoor skills recently would still recall how to do it all, let alone know enough to then go out and teach Scouts, which is pretty much what they're required to do as a SM.

I wouldn't presume it, any insurance carrier would rightly walk away from covering you (and I don't think BSA can plausibly self-insure, do you? I don't think COs would allow them to, if they used their brains) if you did on major matters...

Here's the problem, though. In the only other volunteer organization with which I have been affiliated, the American Red Cross (I got disaster training...And only then did I figure out that without the ability to drive I was functionally non-deployable *cry*), there are professionals at a much deeper level than there ever is for Boy Scouts, if you think about it. Chapters of ARC (their equivalent to councils) have people specialized in disaster response, or health and safety, or whatnot. Volunteers are overseen in virtually everything by the professionals. Training is overseen by the professionals, training is coordinated by the professionals.

Which makes sense, because even for stuff the volunteers can do (like Mass Care, otherwise known as running an evacuation shelter) with relatively little training (I think it was 12 hours total I got for all my certs?), the stakes are high. Volunteers run evacuation shelters - as staff on the line and as on-site managers. Volunteers are the folks who deploy to assist victims in the event of a house fire.

You're talking, at a minimum, NJCubScouter, about a SM needing not only to be trained in, but be a *trainer* in those skills. A trainer - often enough to Scouts, but also likely to ASMs.

Which raises a question that, to be frank, makes me a little uncomfortable to be asking. Actually, a few questions. The first makes me squirm, the rest not so much.

1. At what point does the level of knowledge required of an SM (or CM), as a practical matter, cross the line from what we can expect reasonably of a volunteer (whom we must presume, for the purposes of any training, comes to us totally unskilled) to what is basically a professional position?

2. Training: If it is to be recalled, it needs to be practiced. Training should, if you don't do "drills" like the ARC does, be recurring - meaning your "camping cert", for example, would only last 1 or 2 years before you train again.

NJCubScouter: You raise good points. I don't know if it's dumb luck or what, re Monmouth Council in particular. (There's also a question of "Who the heck would they merge with?", now that I think about it: Culturally, Monmouth and Ocean counties exist as nearly a pair, but the distance factors make any council covering both counties, let alone any others, seem unlikely, offhand. Economically, you might bunch Monmouth in with Mercer and Northern NJ, but the cultural differences are pretty vast. Population-wise, it gets harder, because the population is pretty-well bunched up on the coast in Monmouth and Ocean. You can't, I think, discount the sheer logistics - NJ looks like a tiny state, until you try to travel in it.)

So far as where the thread should be, I was hoping to keep the politics out of it and get (relatively) dispassionate "ground truth", but that was probably optimistic.

Scoutfish:

NYT publishes virtually all of their polling data; you can usually look it up. Having *done* a few of their polls when I worked as a survey interviewer during college, I feel confident in saying it was most-likely a Random Digit Dial telephone poll covering at *least* all of NYC's area codes. But usually, because the Times likes to see itself as more of a national paper than a New York paper, they go for the entirety of the lower 48. (Nobody I know does AK or HI, the time differences would make telephone polls insanely expensive to run for very little benefit.)

Wow, did the original topic last even 24 hours before drifting? Count me amused.

I have one query for both sides: What makes you think things would change even if local control were passed?

After all, it's not a given that the LDS will leave the BSA. Setting up their own program would take years.

Similarly, the Catholic Church - Yeah, I don't see the bishops pulling support from the BSA. They have a ready competitor in CYO, but I don't see CYO succeeding outside of the urban dioceses - which, amusingly enough for an organization started to serve kids in the cities, is where BSA seems weakest.

And you can't presume that new COs would just flock in once local control was passed. It would take years.

Raisinemright: Is it wrong for a guy of 26 to envy a bunch of Cub Scouts?

The one caution I have re everybody's plans: The fingerprints. They're not bad, they're fun for the kids (which is the most important thing), but I think parents need to have it explained to them that the cards are more of a keepsake than anything else, just for the sake of truth in advertising - I think it'd be bad if the parents got a false sense of security. The rules in most areas that I'm familiar with are clear that any such fingerprints can't be kept by the police, even if the parents want that, and I'd be surprised if such a fingerprint card met the technical requirements (or chain of custody requirements, if it was produced via this method) to be used in any conceivable situation. Much more effective, if you're worried about missing/runaway/abducted kids, I'd think, if you instead advised the parents to keep stuff with the child's hair/skin/DNA on it for police forensics types to collect and analyze in the event.

So, I'm at my local community college today, getting ready for a class (Yes, at 7:05 in the morning - class is at 8), and one of the other paralegal students (virtually all are 20+ years older than me, to explain this next) in this morning mentions how their son/grandson (I want to say grandson, but am not sure and not going to ask) is having their Eagle Court of Honor soon and how they're planning for it. So this wanders into a conversation about Scouting generally...And one of the other people in the room asks how all the bans and stuff have impacted Scouting. I winced a bit - as my info indicates, I live in Monmouth Council's territory, and while Monmouth Council was the Council involved in BSA v Dale, one of the things nobody mentions in describing the impact of the lawsuit upon the BSA is the impact it had upon the Council: The lawsuit seems to have kneecapped them financially - while I don't have numbers, it's seen most obviously by the fact that they sold off their Council Service Center (or at least moved out of it and are supposed to be selling it), which had been right down the street from my house on prime real estate (owned tax-free, if I remember right!) right across from Township Hall along a major thoroughfare, and moved it to a fairly isolated location, particularly by comparison...And the fact that they nearly went bankrupt, I believe. (I still have zero idea how they managed not to sell off Quail Hill (the in-council camp) or Forestburg (the out-of-council camp in upstate NY).)

But the question is a good one, even if the conversation where I am is moved on.

The bans on support some jurisdictions have implemented don't really show up here, to my knowledge - Scouts in Monmouth County NJ still get much the same sort of support from the community we always have, though without knowing better I'd suspect that the situation hasn't been helpful. But locally, the Scouts don't seem to be as dependent on local towns/cities to, say, act as charter organizations. That's not the case elsewhere, I know.

So what have you seen where you are?

What I've seen:

Locally, as I said, not much impact (from what I can tell), except that maybe things got a bit difficult financially, because our Council was the party to the BSA v Dale lawsuit that went all the way to the Supreme Court. Certainly the roster of units on the website looks the same as I recall it from 10-15 years ago.

In the region, different story. I'm given to understand (per the NY Post) that Scouting in New York City got hurt pretty bad when the City banned the BSA from using City-owned facilities, using City organizations as COs, or the like. Mutterings like "500 scouts in all of Manhattan" were voiced in February, which made my eyes bug out.

But maybe others here can provide ground truth on that situation, or the situation elsewhere in the US.

I'm unfamiliar with the precise boundaries of this theme, but if you interpret it broadly:

If they already have visited the local police station (which I admit would be my first choice for kids of that age), I don't know, but a police officer of any sort coming to them might be more of the same. If you're on good terms with a criminal defense lawyer, or a prosecutor, or a judge - Heck, even if you aren't, I don't think it'd hurt to just call your local county-level trial court (in NJ it's the Superior Court), get a court administrator, and ask if there are any judges (and court staff) willing to meet with a Cub Scout den, and see if they can rope in a prosecutor and defense lawyer too, with you going to them at the courthouse maybe. Most den meetings happen too late in the day for the boys to see trials (those tend to be wrapping up around 3-5 PM) or most court sittings at all, sadly - unless you can somehow meet on a day where the kids do not have school but that *isn't* a court holiday, and if you can, then, obviously, you want to be careful what cases the boys encounter. (Realistically, I would let the court staff decide what makes sense for the age group - They know better than you do which cases would be appeal-bait if Cub Scouts are in the audience, what cases would bore the kids, and so forth.)

No, court doesn't necessarily have the cool factor of the cops, but that doesn't mean it can't keep them interested. If nothing else, it shows where arguing with their parents can get them - law school and a high-paying job as an attorney.

First off: Onevoice....Wow. I can't think of a harder thing for kids at that age to deal with. Sounds like you handled it masterfully. I'll get to your question in a minute.

Next: Pack212...Great idea. A "bus plan" might feel extreme to some for a voluntary organization like a Scout unit (as opposed to business or government where you usually see them), but now that you mention it, it just feels *right*. There's not just picking up where things were left in the event of a loss, there's matters like "How do you tell the Scouts? *Do* you tell the Scouts?" that should be discussed and agreed upon in advance, where it seems like "Just follow the plan" might be far more doable for a person than thinking on their feet.

My immediate thought on such a matter would be that you want potentially every parent advised of the *existence* of the plan (if you can do that without the kids knowing) *before* an emergency occurs, *as well as* (for example) Charter Organization and Council folks. (And, obviously, have multiple people have copies.)

The way I see it? IRL, I'm training to be a paralegal (Warning: I Am Not A Lawyer. Nothing I post here is intended to be legal advice. I do not intend, am not qualified, and are not licensed to give legal advice. Consult *your* attorney with any specific issues! The Unauthorized Practice Of Law is usually a crime and may be a felony! ...There, I'm in the clear...). A "bus plan" for a Scout unit, to me, is like a person having a will. I know how uncomfortable planning the latter can be for the person whose will it is...But I also know how essential it is to have one that's well-done. (And, in both cases, how essential it is to keep *every line* of either up to date. When your lawyer recommends annually (or at least after significant events) drawing up a new will, it's not just to soak you for money. It's because it's vital to make sure the will is legally clear and accurately reflects your wishes; the alternative is typically a very messy fight in probate court if anyone challenges it.) If it were my place to do so, if I were National for example, I'd at least strongly recommend (and would, honestly, require) that every Scout unit, every District, every Council have a "bus plan" of some sort, and furthermore (perhaps along with the recharter process for units) that the unit plans be reviewed (and updated if need be) by the SM/CM, select ASMs/ACMs, the CC, and the COR at a minimum, on a regular basis (at least annually), with District and Council plans being reviewed regularly by folks at those levels. It's uncomfortable, yes. But it's necessary. The way I see it, just as a parent of minor children really owes it to their children to have plans in place (including wills, guardian selections (and getting the assent of the prospective guardian beforehand!), etc.) in case the parents die, Scout organizations owe it to their Scouts to have proper planning for these sorts of things in place and to have those plans reflective of current circumstances.

And now, back to onevoice: The idea of a trust or foundation as suggested by others isn't a *bad* one, but check with a lawyer (and your pack's council). Your state, the IRS, the BSA, etc. may have certain requirements - and it may be an expensive thing to administer. If you are at all unsure about their feelings, though, approach the family, explain the situation, and ask their opinion.

My personal instinct, though, is that people who donated to the pack likely intended the donation to be used *by the pack*, *for the benefit of the pack* in some way. That is key. (I will say (consistent, of course, with my previous warning) that, *as I understand it*, in most states, donor intent trumps family wishes in a circumstance like this. Seeking the family's opinion is still a good idea, but I am not sure it would be of any effect legally.) A campership/scholarship fund is one way you could honor the Cubmaster the donations were made in honor of and also fulfill the donors' intent. If you have a substantial amount of donations, it could be that you could potentially set up an endowment of some sort, investing the principal, and using a portion of the interest (leaving the rest to grow the endowment and maintain the endowment) for Scouting-related purposes. Scouts should pay their own way, yes, but such an endowment could, for example, be dedicated to the rent or ownership (and maintenance and other expenses) of Scout-specific facilities on the part of the pack (if it were a *really* substantial sum), or to cushion against dues increases in the future...Whatever would seem appropriate and financially prudent.

I would definitely approach professionals (lawyers, accountants, etc.) on an informal basis before you do anything with the money, though. They may not need to do anything; they can at least lay out what the options specifically are where you are, and I know most lawyers at least offer a free initial consultation.

Scoutfish: It was what it was. It's been years, I can look back on it with some distance.

Moose: Oh, yeah. You're in part speaking of the passage of time, something that has not gone unnoticed by me, either. 15 years ago, I don't know if special-needs kids would have been accepted in *any* troop, in my council or any others. (By accepted: Sure, they would be signed up. But *really* accepted? I never would presume the boys in any troop would accept a disabled scout, and 15 years ago, while it never happened to me, I would (in retrospect) have been totally unsurprised if there was resistance from the adults, too.) 15 years ago, certainly, even where there was acceptance in principle, there was basically no knowledge. (I'm not sure which applied to my former troop. My dad, when I discussed it a few days ago, seemed to have the attitude no knowledge would have helped, past a certain point.) That, certainly from reading this forum, does not appear the case today.

Now, that doesn't mean I necessarily agree with how BSA appears to be handling special-needs scouts. I'm still a huge believer that kids with disabilities should be integrated to the maximum extent with a standard troop if it's at all possible - Yes, it will be awkward. The kids won't know how to react, and the parents...I'll be totally honest, the parents would be worse in my experience. Most parents, they encounter a disabled kid and, let's be honest: One of the *first* thoughts that goes through their mind, like it or not, is likely something along the lines of "Thank God that's not my kid". A disabled kid in their Scout troop or pack will throw even the parents who think they're really tolerant for a loop.

But I don't think "special-needs troops", as I understand the concept (which is to say, a troop specifically for Scouts with any sort of disability), can escape the problem of the kids with special needs standing out purely *because* of the disabilities (and likely being something of a freak show to "regular" troops at events with both, let's be honest). I'm not a fan of "inclusive language" or "person-focused" language. I'm not "visually impaired" or "a person with a visual impairment", I'm blind. I may be able to read print, but I'm still blind. It's a matter-of-fact thing with me, as it would be for 90-99% of Scouts with disabilities - it's a good chance that, like me, they've had their disabilities since birth or shortly thereafter. They don't know what it's like *not* to be disabled...But if I'm any example, they know they are more than "different", they are in fact disabled, and pretending otherwise is just lying to them. It's not even a good lie.

How do the two or three things in that paragraph tie together? Perspective. The language thing is a pet peeve, yes, because it tries to create a myth that the disability doesn't matter. Special-needs troops seem like the same thing; They're certainly appropriate for kids with especially severe disabilities, but I don't believe they should be the default solution. (I'm not unwilling to be realistic, and say that there might be kids "too disabled for Scouting", and acknowledge that that may have described me. (In which case I do wish people had been honest and said that at the time, rather than letting me bash my head against the wall.) It would pain me to *ever* say a kid is too disabled for Scouting, or too disabled for a regular unit, but if that's the honest evaluation of SMs or others, they owe it, IMHO, to voice that to the kid. It's hard, very hard (having been on either side of such a discussion in other contexts), but part of actually *living* with a disability is to accept that, yes, some things are not going to happen for you, and I think any adult owes a kid with a disability the *honesty* of sometimes being the voice that realistically evaluates the situation. You could be wrong, the kid could find another unit that can handle them, but that will not be all units.)

The reason I say Special Needs Troops should be the last ditch exception is because, from where I sit, they risk doing the same thing the Disabilities Awareness pin in Cub Scouts, as I've seen it described, would seem likely to do: Mark out disabled kids for pity, or (possibly worse) feed the "Eric Weihenmeyer Syndrome" (My own nickname for the idea that disability isn't a handicap - after the blind guy who climbed Everest and has since become the most annoying motivational speaker ever).

More important to me is *humanizing* disabilities...Presenting it to the kids as "Yeah, he's blind/deaf/in a wheelchair/autistic. Your point is?"

I think what kids (of CS age particularly, but also of Boy Scout age) need to learn re disabilities is: It is. You cannot know all or even most of what it's like to, say, be blind by going around in sleep shades for a day (Though if you've never done *that* with kids, I recommend it - your state's disability services agency can provide can provide canes they can use (you don't get a guide dog til, at minimum, 18, sorry kids!) - it *has* opened eyes); On the other hand, most disabled kids would be totally lost if they were to wake up able-bodied. Even if, like I am, you're a skeptic of the idea of disabled people having a unique culture, there's no doubting it shapes your identity. Spare your pity or sympathy - most kids with disabilities hate that from an early age. Instead? Try honestly including them. (When you get past the shell most kids with disabilities build up (by the time they enter school, even), to say nothing of the weird sense of humor, they can sometimes be desperate for an honest friendship with someone, to the point that the tiniest things can go a long way - and if you actually connect, it's like witnessing a miracle.)

Maybe, for example, the blind kid can't safely *play* football, but with good descriptions? The best "field sense" and strategic mind for the game I have ever seen...Was possessed by a kid who was even more blind than I am, who was totally blind.

Point is, the kids need to learn...The disability makes the other kid nothing special, no less human. Their dumber moments deserve no sympathy; ordinary competence shouldn't necessarily be trumpeted, either. (Though you would be forgiven if your jaw drops a bit more at the extraordinary moments; we all do that even if we should know better, not just "Wow, that kid did that", but "Wow, the kid did that, with disabilities too!") In my case: I may have swore at the square knot and the cerebral palsy/fine motor issues that made it impossible, but even if I couldn't hack it as a Scout, I wouldn't let other Scouts then think I was going to take the easy way out.

I'm not sure that can be done any other way than including kids with disabilities, as much as you can, until it feels weird for those Scouts *not* to be present.

None of this, though, should be taken to mean that I don't think Scouting in the US has come a *really* long way over even 15 years. It has - 15 years ago you would never imagine kids with autism or any kind of noticable disability in Scouting; beyond it being more difficult, they really don't fit the image those involved usually have of Scouts, and definitely didn't then. In that context, even the occasional Scout with a disability in a regular troop is something to applaud, even separate special-needs troops are a way forward.

I just don't think the job is done yet.

Grudges were never my style. Nah, the only grudge I have on this account is against the square knot.

So, I'm not sure if I necessarily belong here, but I stumbled upon this site while covering the internet in curiosity (I forget about what) and seem drawn to reading it.

Before I go on, though, I should introduce myself.

I'm John Penta. I'm 26, from New Jersey. My scouting experience? I was a Cub Scout the whole way through, from Tiger Cubs all the way to crossing over from pack to my boy scout troop, but dropped out within 8-12 months of crossing over.

My perspective on Scouting, thus, is a bit weird. I'm disabled - have been since birth (I'll elaborate if asked, but, for brevity, I would describe it as a cocktail of physical issues - from motor skills to visual issues - that have also bred mental health issues) - and when I crossed over from Cub Scouts to Boy Scouts when I was 11 or so, the very notion of alternative requirements was just being noted as "something the Boy Scouts might allow". I want to say they came out that year, but I could be wrong. Looking back, I remember being very insistent that I wasn't going to do any such thing unless I had to, being the kind of kid that: A. Was mainstreamed in school for everything but gym class, and had a sense of dignity that was kind of offended by the idea; B. Intended fully to get Eagle (or get as close as I could) without any "special help" or any reason to "asterisk" it; C. Hated ever being identified as disabled...And then I remember my frustration with the requirements regarding hiking and the ^%$#@ square knot (No, I couldn't tie my shoes - no, I still can't; Yes, this still humiliates me and drives me nuts.) being the direct reason why I quit Scouting. (There where a whole host of indirect reasons, looking back - including the fact that the troop, I can see with some distance, really wasn't all that accepting of people who were different (let alone as different as a disabled kid!), though I think it might be fair to mention that none of the other nearby troops were any better on that score.) I was, as you might imagine, humiliated by that, and I did my best to forget about my Scouting experience for a time. I kept the handbook, I used it for miscellaneous reference for years til I lost it; I even kept my uniform from back then hanging in my closet til I went off to college. (It was always something...challenging me, mocking me, almost.)

And I guess I still am interested. I might never be lucky enough to have kids or be a leader in scouting, but I won't deny I have opinions and thoughts, from my own perspective, on the issues which seem to pop up. They may be less qualified than most, but eh.